Metered Access

Crain's Detroit Business is a metered site. Print and digital subscribers have unlimited access to stories, but registered users are limited to eight stories every 30 days. After viewing three metered stories, you'll be asked to register or log in. After eight more stories in 30 days, you'll be asked to subscribe.

The gauntlet has been thrown

We reported in today's edition that Chicago-based real estate brokerage Mid-America Real Estate Group is entering the market with a big splash.

Starting this week, the new 12-person firm will be going after retail deals in the region, in a move that caused the closure of two other brokerages; LaKritz Weber and the brokerage arm of Lormax Stern Development Co.

All indications are that this new firm is going to make things interesting in the area, bringing a new competitor to the area with some established people and some new tricks.

They'll be opening a firm with a full pipeline as well: 200 shopping centers and 50 retailers.

Their client list comes from brokers at the two closed firms, but also through taking some clients from a third firm, Landmark Commercial Real Estate, by way of founding principal Brad Rosenberg who left the firm in November with designs on this new firm.

- From Lormax Stern: Daniel Stern, Chris Brochert and Jack Uhazie. NOTE: Lormax Stern will continue to operate is well-established retail development business as it has in the past.

In addition to the local principals, they'll be drawing on the resources from the Chicago office, which also connects to the Mid-America offices in Minneapolis and Milwaukee.

Feeding those offices and Detroit is the key to the operation, an affiliation with the national ChainLinks franchise.

LaKritz has held that franchise for the Detroit market, while Mid-America has it in Illinois and Wisconsin.

Brokers in Detroit live off the deals they get through these affiliations as national retailers working with someone in Atlanta, for example, need to get a Detroit lease done and kick the deal to a guy here. Likewise, the Detroit guys kick deals over to the Atlanta guys when they get a chance.

The full story hasn't come out yet as to how Mid-America did this deal, but the ChainLinks franchise is a key to it. It's unclear how they convinced 30-year veteran Bill LaKritz to close his company, in the process giving up the ChainLinks franchise. On top of that, he will now go over to Mid-America as a broker — after running his own firm for all these years.

Principals from LaKritz are founding partners in Mid-America, while Bill LaKritz is an associate broker. Lormax guys, likewise are founding partners.

I'm sure the real story on this will come out once the dust settles. And I'm guessing it's not a rosy one.

In the meantime, stay tuned on this story. It will be an interesting time to watch the retail market.

For one, there's the revitalization of the local economy that the guys with the sharp pencils keep forecasting and, now, there's a new player in the mix to fight over those new deals to be done.